Elongate medical devices used in interventional procedures, such as catheters and wire guides, navigate through a path inside a body cavity, duct, or vessel of a patient toward a point of treatment. A wire guide may be inserted into the patient and define the path. After the wire guide is positioned within the patient, another medical device, such as a catheter, is placed over the wire guide and moved along the length of the wire guide toward the point of treatment. The paths are often long and tortuous due to the presence of natural bends and/or curves, or unnatural impediments, such as tumors, build-ups, and/or strictures. The presence of a tortuous path may make navigation of the elongate medical device difficult. Additionally, a tortuous path may increase the likelihood that the elongate medical device traumatizes an inner wall of the body cavity, duct, or vessel as the device navigates through the path.
Elongate medical devices have a degree of flexibility in order to navigate through the a tortuous path. However, if the medical devices are too flexible, they are prone to kinking, which hinders the device's ability to navigate through the paths. In addition, the more flexibility the medical device has, the less torqueability the device has, which makes curving or turning the device through the bends or around the impediments in the path more difficult.